No abstract available.
Aged* ; Dementia* ; Humans

Memory disorder is the most consistent neuropsychological finding in schizophrenia and seems to be a stable trait in it. It is suggested that memory dysfunction found in patients with schizophrenia is primary to biological abnormalities, not secondary to attention deficits they have. Although temporal lobe structures including hippocampus and thalamus have traditionally been thought to be implicated regions for memory disorder in schizophrenia, recent studies indicate the possibility of abnormalities in the frontal lobe and the neural circuits between brain regions. Advanced research methods such as functional imaging technique are expected to produce more detailed informations about memory function in schizophrenia.
Brain ; Frontal Lobe ; Hippocampus ; Humans ; Memory Disorders* ; Memory* ; Schizophrenia* ; Temporal Lobe ; Thalamus

No abstract available.

Venlafaxine is often considered to be safer than established antidepressants except the risk of hypertension. In terms of vaginal bleeding associated with venlafaxine, only one case has been reported. The author describes a vaginal bleeding occurred in a 38-year-old depressed patient who has been receiving additional venlafaxine during fluoxetine medication. Discontinuation of venlafaxine supported the assumption that the vaginal bleeding was an adverse drug reaction of venlafaxine. Physicians should be alerted to the possibility of bleeding tendency in patients who have taken venlafaxine.
Adult ; Antidepressive Agents ; Drug-Related Side Effects and Adverse Reactions ; Fluoxetine ; Hemorrhage ; Humans ; Hypertension ; Uterine Hemorrhage* ; Venlafaxine Hydrochloride

OBJECTIVES: Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is one of the most useful techniques for assessing localized changes in cerebral blood flow and oxygenation using diverse challenge paradigm. This review presents the results of BOLD contrast fMRI studies relating to various psychiatric disorders. METHODS: A number of fMRI articles on this subject in psychiatric journals were surveyed. RESULTS: Even with some methodological limitations, most studies showed that BOLD changes appeared with differences between psychiatric patients and control subjects. CONCLUSIONS: Undoubtedly, fMRI will extend our understanding of neurobiological basis of psychiatric disorders and offer an unprecedented opportunity for the assessment and management of brain pathology.
Brain Diseases ; Humans ; Magnetic Resonance Imaging ; Oxygen

OBJECTIVE: This study was to identify whether working memory (WM) can be clearly subdivided according to auditory and visual modality. To do this, we administered the most recent and universal clinical WM measures in a mixed psychiatric sample. METHODS: A total of 115 patients were diagnosed on the basis of DSM-IV diagnostic criteria and with MINI-Plus 5.0, a structured diagnostic interview. WM subtests of Korean version of Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-IV and Korean version of Wechsler Memory Scale-IV were administered to assess WM. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to observe whether WM measures fit better to a one-factor or two-factor model. RESULTS: CFA results demonstrated that a two factor model fits the data better than one-factor model as expected. CONCLUSION: Our study supports a modality model of WM, or the existence of modality-specific WM systems, and thus poses a clinical significance of assessing both auditory and visual WM tests.
Adult ; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; Humans ; Intelligence ; Memory ; Memory, Short-Term*

No abstract available.
Neurosciences* ; Psychopharmacology*

Symptom profiles in schizophrenia consists of positive and negative symptom dimensions which are considered to be related to different underlying pathophysiologies and neural substrates. The purpose of the study was to identify the possible relationship between relative regional cerebral perfusion and positive and negative symptom dimension in unmedicated patients with schizophrenia. Twenty-seven unmedicated patients with schizophrenia(13 patients who were antipsychotic drug-naive and 14 patients who had been drug-free for at least 1 week) were included in the study. Regional cerebral perfusion was studied with the single-photon emission computed tomography(SFECT). Symptom dimensions were assessed with positive and negative syndrome scale(PANSS). The scores of each symptom dimension were correlated with regional cerebral perfusion. The results were 1) positive symptom dimension score was significantly related to decreased perfusion in the medial temporal lobe and increased perfusion in the frontal lobe, 2) negative symptom dimension score was significantly related to decreased perfusion in the basal ganglia, thalamus and increased perfusion in the frontal lobe. These results suggest that positive symptom dimension is associated with the dysfunction of the link between the frontal lobe and the medial temporal lobe and that negative symptom dimension is related with the impairment of frontal-basal ganglia circuit.
Basal Ganglia ; Frontal Lobe ; Ganglia ; Humans ; Perfusion ; Schizophrenia* ; Temporal Lobe ; Thalamus ; Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon*

OBJECTIVE: Mixed states are difficult to define precisely and to recognize accurately. Moreover, the DSM-IV criteria for diagnosis of a mixed episode might be too restrictive. The purpose of this study was to investigate the possibility of a mixed episode in bipolar inpatients hospitalized with DSM-IV manic episodes using the Cincinnati criteria, which is a broader criteria compared to DSM-IV. METHODS: Inpatient charts of manic patients were carefully evaluated to determine the presence of depressive symptoms in the Cincinnati criteria. The probable mixed patient group was compared with the definitely manic patient group on demographic and clinical variables. The predictability of depressive symptoms for a mixed episode was assessed. RESULTS: Twenty-one out of 101 manic inpatients were possibly diagnosed as mixed episodes. They showed more psychiatric family history, comorbid personality disorder and suicide attempts. Two symptoms (suicidal ideation and helplessness or hopelessness) had good positive predictive value. CONCLUSION: Diagnosis of a mixed episode can be increased with careful interview and by using a broader diagnostic criteria. The presence of suicidal ideation and helplessness or hopelessness may suggest a mixed state.
Bipolar Disorder ; Depression ; Diagnosis ; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ; Humans ; Inpatients ; Personality Disorders ; Suicidal Ideation ; Suicide

OBJECTIVE: Under the hypothesis that activated brain regions of patients with schizophrenia differ from those of normal subjects during memory task performance, this study was aimed to investigate topographic changes related to memory functions in schizophrenia. METHOD: Subjects of this study consisted of 20 unmedicated patients with schizophrenia and 19 normal controls who were matched for age, sex, and handedness. Quantitative EEG(QEEG) with 32 channels was recorded with eyes closed(EEG0) and open(EEG1) in a resting condition and during computerized verbal encoding(EEG2) and recognition(EEG3) tasks. RESULTS: During EEG1, 2, and 3, there was a decrease in alpha activity in both groups compared to EEG0 and the change in alpha activity of patients was significantly lesser than normal controls in the occipital region. Pairwise comparison showed that the alpha activity of normal controls significantly increased from EEG1 to EEG2 in the parietal region and from EEG1 to EEG3 in all regions except both frontal regions while those of patients did not change. The beta activity of normal controls significantly increased from EEG1 to EEG2 in both temporal regions and from EEG1 to EEG3 in the frontal, temporal, and parietal regions while those of patients significantly increased only in the parieto-occipital region. CONCLUSION: These results indicate that the frontal lobe, temporal lobe, and thalamus are not appropriately activated during memory tasks in schizophrenia. It may be proposed that the learing of visually presented words in patients with schizophrenia depends on distinct memory process such as priming.
Brain ; Electroencephalography* ; Frontal Lobe ; Functional Laterality ; Humans ; Memory Disorders ; Memory* ; Rabeprazole ; Schizophrenia* ; Task Performance and Analysis* ; Temporal Lobe ; Thalamus